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I never crushed Assyria's sons
To build Colossal temples high;
I bade the sire his little ones
Watch with a parent's eye.
Throughout the land no vassal strives
With a hard lord, nor wears his gyves.

I bade my subjects plant the vine
Throughout the realms my sceptre sways;
And bade them drink the joyous wine,
A feandst away their days.
Sardanapalus thence hath lost
His golden shrine and holocaust.

For had I made the rivers dance

With waves of blood from prostrate foes; And couched a warrior's murdering lance, And broke my land's repose;

Then had my glory walked abroad
And I had been enshrined a god.

What else but wide-spread carnage made
The founder of our line a god ;-
A man, whose dark ambition bade
Earth be a crimsoned sod;

A bloody hunter, yet behold!
His shrine is of thrice beaten gold.

And she, the queen of Belus' son,
Who built this sanctuary high,

And planned it-proud presuming one! With roof-tree laid against the sky; Because she loved war,-when she died Wide realms her queenship deified.

But I, because my regal day

Hath been arrayed in pleasure's dress; Because I loved soft music's lay And beauty's dear caress; Because I women loved, and wine, Am thence to be denied a shrine.

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